But his father didn’t hear him, scuttling along, elbows flapping like the wings of a bird.
The thin rain was cold on Andy’s face. As he hurried along behind Vinny, he noticed for the first time that his father had, not a limp exactly, but a slight dip, or tilt, on his right side, as if one leg was a bit shorter than the other. Vinny tilted.
The street was busy with pedestrians and traffic. Andy had to dodge around people. He ran and caught his father waiting at a corner for the light. “Wait, Vinny. I’ve got to talk to you.”
Vinny smiled. “There’s altogether too much talk in the world already, Andy. It’s what causes most of the trouble.” He looked left and right.
“I want to talk about… about…” Andy was confused. It was Vinny’s business that puzzled him: stale cigarettes. “What will happen if they don’t believe you didn’t steal the cigarettes and they send you to jail? Or they arrest you for selling without a license? Don’t you care?” Vinny walked fast. Andy almost had to run to keep up with him. “Stop and talk to me, Vinny.”
Vinny turned sharply and disappeared into a pub called Ryan’s.
Andy started to follow, but the stale smell of beer and smoke drove him back; he waited outside in the shelter of the doorway and watched people go by, leaning into the rain with their umbrellas.
Vinny came back to get him. “Come in for a minute, will you? I want you to meet some friends. Come in.”
He followed him in reluctantly.
“This is my Andy,” Vinny announced proudly to the men in the bar. “Aren’t I the most fortunate man in all the world?”
The men crowded around enthusiastically and shook Andy by the hand or mussed his already mussed hair. Then they slapped Vinny on the back. “Sit down, Vinny, and I’ll buy you a drink,” said one of the men. “And the lad, too.”
“I’ll wait outside,” said Andy, the smoke stinging his eyes.
When Vinny reappeared some minutes later, he set off again, his raincoat a little lighter, its tail flapping behind him like a parachute. “Go back,” he said to Andy. “You’ll be drowned following about after me.”
“No. You’ve got to talk to me.”
Vinny disappeared into another pub.
Andy waited.
Vinny popped his head back out the door. “Come in for a minute. Bob MacIntosh and Ian Holt are dying to meet you.”
“No thanks. I’ll wait here,” said Andy.
Vinny went in and brought out a crowd to meet him. Andy had to shake hands with every one of them.
When Vinny emerged, they set off again.
“MacIntosh and Holt are Scots. But they’re all right.”
They were passing a coffee shop. Andy grabbed Vinny’s arm and dragged him inside. “Let’s sit and have a bottle of pop, Father, please? I need to talk to you, and I can’t talk while I’m running to keep up.”
Andy sat while Vinny shuffled reluctantly to the self-serve counter, returned with a tray laden with pop, glass, teapot, spoon, milk, and cup and saucer, and sat down opposite him and began stirring the pot with the spoon.
“Tell me things.”
“What things?” Vinny lit a cigarette. His eyes smiled at Andy through curls of blue smoke.
“I need you to tell me things like… what will we do if they send you to jail?”
“That will never happen, Andy, rest your mind on that. Your father is completely innocent.”
“I know. I believe you. But —”
“Don’t worry your young head, Andy. Everything will be all right. There. Now do you feel better?”
Andy didn’t feel better. He stared into his father’s twinkling eyes. “I’ll feel better when you stop selling cigarettes without a license and get a normal job. And I’ll feel better when we find a nicer place to live.” There, he’d said it: the Mayo was a dump.
His father looked hurt. “So you don’t like my place.”
“It’s — well…” Andy faltered. Then he remembered the cockroaches. “There’s cockroaches, thousands of them, swarming all over. You didn’t warn me. What happens if they bite me and give me some disease? They give me the creeps. And the place is small with the two of us living there — I know you weren’t expecting me, but you’ve had time by now to think about me, haven’t you?” He searched Vinny’s face. “Haven’t you, Father?”
“Aren’t you on my mind all the time? We’ll make plans, Andy, I promise, okay?”
“And I get worried when you stay out late. I’m only eleven, you know. I’m a kid, not a grownup.”
“You’re more grownup than a lot of grownups I know. Anyway, leave it to me. I told you. We’ll make plans, all right?” Vinny got up. “I’ll be back in a jiff.”
Andy looked around for him a few minutes later and saw him joking with customers up at the bar as he sold them cigarettes.
When he came back, Andy said, “What about the cockroaches?”
“Cockroaches will do you no harm, Andy. They don’t bite. Take no notice of them. It’s people you need to watch out for, not God’s harmless creatures who were on this earth a million years before mankind and who’ll be here a million years after the last one of us is gone.”
Andy stayed glued to him for the rest of his rounds, asking questions about his cigarette business and making suggestions, trying to clear the confusion in his mind about having a father who was funny and daring and brave, a father liked by everyone, but who made a living selling stale cigarettes without a license. “I’ve got an idea!” he said. “You could open a little shop to sell the cigarettes! Then you’d get a license from City Hall. Or if you find a job, then I can help at home, I really can. I can wash dishes and fix things. Simple stuff. We can get a cookbook and I’ll learn how to cook so supper’s ready when you get home from work, and we’ll get a dog to watch things while we’re out. I know how to train dogs. It’ll be great, you’ll see.”
Throughout this long speech and other speeches just like it, Vinny smiled happily and proudly at Andy, nodding his head in agreement at everything he said, speaking only to encourage him: “You’re the great talker, Andy, I can see that all right. The great little talker. And you’ve the splendid wee head on your shoulders.”
They bought a toothbrush and toothpaste — Andy didn’t like the powder stuff in the packet — and a few other things at a corner store, including a bag of raisins.
“What’s with the raisins?”
“Didn’t you finish the last of them?”
Vinny sold his last package of cigarettes in a pub called The Pink Elephant. As he came out the door, Andy said, “So if you don’t start your own little shop, will you give it up, the stale cigarette business?”
“I will, I will.”
“You’ll give it up?”
“Didn’t I say I would? You’d convince the Divil himself.”
“You promise?”
“I promise.”
“And you’ll find a job?” By now the rain had got through to his shirt.
“Ah, that’ll be the difficult part, right enough.”
“You’ll find one, I know you will.” Andy punched his father’s arm encouragingly as they headed home through the rain.
Vinny stopped and they stood for a while watching the Mayo Rooms from the opposite side of the street.
“What are we waiting for?” asked Andy.
“Just making sure the coast is clear.”
“The police, you mean?”
“Hmmn.”
“What if they’re inside, Father, waiting for you?”
He shook his head. “Not likely.”
“Maybe I should go first and make sure it’s safe.”
“There’s no necessity, Andy, I can tell how it is just by sniffing the air.” He raised his head and sniffed. “It’s all clear. Come on.”
“Couldn’t you stay with one of your pals until the heat is off?” A part of Andy was quite astounded to hear himself talking like a crime movie. His father was having a peculiar effect on him.
; They entered by the front door. The place was quiet. No police. They climbed the stairs and stood outside the door listening. Nothing. They went inside. It was cold. The window was still open and rain had blown in, wetting the stained curtains and the scarred linoleum floor. Vinny closed the window and then disappeared into the bedroom. Andy followed him in. Vinny was on his knees pulling cigarette cartons out from under the bed and stacking them on the mattress.
“The police might come back and find them,” said Andy. “Couldn’t we dump them in somebody’s garbage bin? You’re not going to sell them anymore, you promised, remember?”
“Don’t worry. Leave it to me.” Vinny counted the cigarette cartons, then went into the kitchen, and Andy could hear him filling the kettle. Vinny called out to him, “I’ll take good care of you, Andy, you’ll see.”
“You’re the one who needs taking care of,” Andy muttered to himself.
“Take off your wet things while I make us a cup of tea,” Vinny shouted from the kitchen, “and help yourself to a dry shirt of mine in the bedroom.”
Andy did as he was told. His father’s shirt was too big, but not by so very much. Andy was hungry. “I’m hungry,” he told Vinny as he came in with the cups and teapot.
“Hungry?” Vinny looked surprised.
“Starving.”
“Wait. I’ll be right back.”
He was away only ten minutes, and brought back with him a box of sugared doughnuts, a dozen, assorted.
“Great,” said Andy when he saw them. “I love doughnuts.”
That evening Vinny stayed home with a newspaper called The Sporting Life, which he appeared to be reading without any of the problems he’d mentioned earlier about failing kindergarten, and even though the print was very tiny and the light was bad from the small bulb hanging shade-less from the center of the room. The back page of the newspaper had a picture of a horse race.
Vinny soon became restless and fidgety, smoking one cigarette after another and constantly jumping up to make tea, strengthened with a drop or two of whiskey. Except for the swish of traffic, the occasional diesel roar of a bus in the main street, and the tattoo of rain on the fire escape, the place was quiet.
There was nothing much for Andy to do in this bare room; there were no books, comics, or magazines, and the light was a bit dim for reading anyway. Andy lay back on the sofa, bored. “A TV would be nice,” he said. “Or a CD player, or a radio so we could listen to music. Don’t you like music, Father?”
Vinny didn’t seem to be listening.
“My friends in Vancouver are probably surfing the Internet and listening to music. Or watching a video. Why’s there no phone?”
“It’s ten o’clock,” said his father, peering at his wrist-watch. “What time do eleven-year-olds go to bed in Vancouver?”
“I’m in Halifax now,” he reminded his father, “which means I come under Halifax rules. What time do kids of eleven go to bed here?”
“Hmmn. I’m not sure. I’d think they’d be well away by ten, don’t you?”
Andy gathered his new toothbrush and toothpaste, and washed in the kitchen. Then he spread the blankets over the sofa and climbed under. “You could tell me a story if you like.”
“I don’t know any stories.”
“You used to tell me stories of the Little People, don’t you remember?”
“You’re too old for stories, Andy. You’ll soon be old enough to vote.”
“No. I’m still a kid, Father. Tell me a story like when I was little.”
Vinny sighed. “Just for a few minutes, then.” He carried his chair over to the sofa and sat beside Andy with his tea and cigarette. “I don’t know if I remember any of the old stories.”
“That’s okay. Anything will do. And would you mind not smoking while you tell it? Secondhand smoke is deadly, didn’t you know that?”
The rain played a riff on the window.
Vinny stubbed out his cigarette. “D’you remember the story of Tir Na n’Og?”
“That’s the place where the Little People come from. The place you get to on a white horse. I remember it.” And Andy did. It was coming back to him. Actually, part of it had never gone away: he often dreamed of white horses galloping over the ocean waves. “But you can tell me again if you like.”
“Tir Na n’Og is the land of youth and immortality.”
“Immortality is when nobody ever gets old or dies, right?”
“That’s it. They live forever and beyond. It’s a place of great beauty, with trees and lakes and rivers to beat anything you ever saw. Those who know say Tir Na n’Og is in the back of beyond. Humans and gods and the Sheehogue live there, side by side, in peace and harmony, with no death or sickness or pain.”
“Sheehogue is the proper name for the Little People.”
“That’s it. Or the Sidhe, the fallen angels from heaven who were not good enough to be saved but not bad enough to be lost.”
“How do you get to Tir Na n’Og?”
“Ah! That’s the difficult part first there must be moonlight. Then you must find a thorn tree where there’s a faery ring — ”
“What does a faery ring look like?”
“A circle of shamrock, or stones, or mushrooms, or buttercups, or the grass growing a certain way so it looks like a ring. Sometimes the Sheehogue will cast a spell, or play a pishogue, or trick, and they’ll build a ring of cowpats to fool you. Or they will grow a ring of clover, or spinach, which they can’t abide. Anyway, if you stand in a proper faery ring on special days, in the moonlight — ”
“What special days?”
“There’s different opinions. But for sure there must be no letter r in the day or in the month.”
“No r?” Andy thought for a while, counting on his fingers. “That means only four days and four months.”
“That’s the truth of it, all right.”
“So let’s say it’s a Sunday evening in May and the moon is shining and you find a faery ring. What do you do then?”
“To find the gateway to Tir Na n’Og, you walk around the ring nine times widdershins — that’s anticlockwise — and you will see the gate open in front of you. Walk through the gate, and if the Sheehogue like you, they will put you up on a white horse and off you will gallop to the land of youth.”
“And if they don’t like you?”
“They will conjure a pishogue. You might walk through the gateway and tumble down a steep bank head over heels, for instance, and when you get up, the gateway and the faery ring have disappeared.”
“Tir Na n’Og sounds like a hard place to find.”
His father nodded. “It is. The back of beyond could be anywhere: deep under the ground or the ocean. The Sheehogue never tell. On top of all that, they like to enchant us with their pishogues. They can be cruel, too. Did you ever feel sharp pains or twinges in your side or your knee or some other place, and you don’t know how they got there or where they came from?”
“Mother said they were growing pains.”
“She was wrong, God rest her. It’s the Sheehogue up to their pishogues, shooting their darts into you. They like to see the commotion on your face. And it’s often the Sheehogue who cause the papers and leaves to swirl along the street and the dust to blow in your eyes. You turn your head sharp-like when you glimpse a bright color, or you close your eyes against a sudden burst of sunlight, and you walk smack into a heap of doggy do. Ha! It’s the Sheehogue having their fun! And the louder you swear at them, the more they laugh at you. Sometimes, if there’s no wind, and it’s quiet enough, you might hear a faint tinkling sound, like tiny bells; that’s the sound of the Sheehogue laughing.”
Andy smiled. He was warm and drowsy. Tiny bells. His father’s voice. He was four years old again. “More,” he murmured. “Tell me more.”
A heavy truck splashed by in the street.
“The Sheehogue are almost impossible to see. They don’t make things easy for us, except sometimes, at a certain time of year, when the moonlight is
shining on the thorn trees, anyone passing by with two good eyes in his head can see the Little People playing and dancing, and the faery music can be heard for a mile around. But men and women know to turn their heads away from the thorn trees because if they see the Sheehogue, then it’s the terrible bad luck will come to them, sure as grass is green and thorn berry is red.”
“Have you… ever seen them, Father?”
“I have. Once. When I was a child like yourself.”
“And did you turn your eyes away?”
“I did not. Children are exempt. If your heart’s a child’s heart, and if your eyes are clean, then you need never fear the moonlight or the thorn trees; you can look at them all you want and the Sheehogue will wave to you and bless you as you pass by and call your name.”
“Will… they know… I changed my name… to Andy?”
“They will know,” whispered his father.
“I love the old stories,” a Young One said wistfully. “Do you think he might tell the story of how Oisín fell in love with Niamh? It’s the most beautiful story I ever — “
“You can ask Niamh herself when you get home,” said her friend sarcastically.
“It’s not the same. The boy’s father is a fine storyteller. He is tender and true. Besides, Niamh exaggerates. If I asked anyone, it’d be Oisín.”
“Shush, you two,” whispered the Old One. “The boy sleeps.”
10
IN SPITE OF HIS PROMISE and his good intentions, Vinny continued with his “business” until all the cigarettes were gone. “I meant that I’d stop as soon as the present supply ran out,” he explained to Andy. “I couldn’t leave them about the place. There will be no more after this, I promise.”
In the days that followed, Andy felt stronger and, most important of all, was happy to be with his dad, who would soon get a proper job, and then their lives would be normal; it was simply a matter of time. When he inspected himself in the bathroom mirror, though it was covered in mildew and the light was small and dim, he saw that the bruises were just about gone from his face. His eyes seemed brighter. But his dark hair, unbrushed and uncombed, was longer and wilder. He didn’t look too clean. In Vancouver they’d had three bathrooms with plenty of hot water and shampoo and hair conditioner and body lotion and he could shower whenever he wanted. But here…
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